Taking your 4WD offroad is one of the most liberating experiences for those of us lucky enough to own a 4WD, but if you are worth a pinch of bull dust, or Aussie beach sand, you’d know that the first tip for driving of the tarmac is to drop your tyre pressures down, exactly what pressures will depend solely on your 4WD weight, tyre size and the prevailing conditions.

Typical on-road pressures that most 4WD’s will be set to are determined by your vehicle manufacturer, and typically range from around 28 PSI all the way up to around 38 PSI this is all relative to your vehicles GVM (maximum loaded weight, Gross Vehicle Mass), the larger your vehicles GVM the higher this pressure is likely to be.

Now with this considered, you have many options when you set your tyre pressures and as mentioned it will mean figuring out just the right pressures for your vehicle, this can be problematic considering the number of tyre sizes that are compatible out of the box with many 4WD’s. To get to the bottom of this there are a handful of ways to calculate the ideal pressures for your 4WD.

The first being the 4PSI rule, this rule is a great way for trouble shooting your ideal pressures, essentially when your tyres are cold, you should set them to your suggested air pressure on your vehicles placard. After driving for 15 minutes to half an hour, when the tyre warms up, your pressures should have risen by 4 PSI if the tyre has more than 4 PSI you need to put a little bit more air in by a couple of PSI and start the process again.

Typically, dropping the pressures for offroad driving, you need to consider that in the ideal circumstances you can have up to 200% increase in the surface area for your tyres contact area when you are driving on incredibly soft surfaces. This means that when you hit the beach you don’t just bury your 4WD up the chassis as soon as you leave the parking lot! The same rules apply for running low pressures, you can do the 4PSI check to see if you are firstly, driving too quickly for the pressures as there will be excess heat and your pressures will rise extremely high, also if you have your tyres low enough to cope with the soft surface, you’d be surprised at just how low you can go when you are dropping your pressures even with a tubeless tyre, where some lighter vehicles like Suzuki’s Jimny and Sierra can with the right tyres be set as low as 5 PSI even without bead locking devices!

The next test you can implement for getting your tyre pressures sorted is by taking advantage of a stick of chalk! This sounds crazy enough, but essentially we are looking at what your contact patch looks like, by coloring in a thick line (were talking like 50-75mm thick) across your tyres tread, once it is colored in, you can drive about one or two car lengths forward, this will allow the chalk to be wiped off the tyre on the part that contacts the road surface, this means you can see if the whole tyre is contacting the road, with our stick of chalk, we can also see just how low we can drop pressures before the tyre starts to basically invert, over flexing the tread of the tyre creating massive overheating issues. This will give you an idea exactly what your maximum and minimum pressures are for your vehicle!

Armed with your maximum and minimum pressures, you are probably going to want to tackle the tracks, but without the right tools for the job, changing pressures is simple and quick!

The first tool for the job is the Kwiky Tyre Deflator, this beast of a tool fits in your pocket or can stash in your glovebox, and works by screwing onto your tyres valve, once fastened it uses an internally contained valve core removal tool to allow as much air to flow as needed, with the valve core removed you can drop all 4 tyres to 0 PSI in just a matter of minutes, but with the integrated valve and bourdon tube gauge, you have plenty of control over just what pressures your tyres are set too.

With ultimate control you can quickly and easily control your tyre pressures.

Now when you’ve had your fun, got your rig muddy, and are ready for the drive home you will probably want to get your tyres back up to on-road pressures. Before the rubber hits the road, you will want to hook up to an air compressor. Thankfully the Adventure Kings range has a handful of portable and functional air compressors that are definitely up to the task!

Starting with the most popular unit in the range, the Adventure Kings Thumper MAX the dual piston air compressor outputs a HUGE 300L of high pressure air every minute allowing one of the fastest inflation times on the market, coupled up with a 3in1 tyre inflator you have air on demand, the inflator acts as a trigger valve, once you release the trigger it allows the 8m air hose to fill with high pressure air, automatically the Thumper max pressure switch triggers stopping the compressor from overheating, and allowing you to check the pressure of your tyres, real time.

The next air compressor un the range is the Thumper MKII, whilst not offering as many features or the same blistering output as the Thumper MAX, this compressor is still a staple in the industry offering an impressive 160L per minute output and the ability to pump out a heap of high pressure air ready for pumping your tyres back up. Unfortunately, the thumper MKII does not have a pressure cut off which means switching the compressor, on and off to check your tyres pressure when re-inflating!

Both air compressors in the lineup are compatible with the 8m extension hose meaning that you can reach all the way around even larger caravans with ease.

So next time you are hitting the tracks, make sure the first thing you think about is getting your tyres to the right pressures for the job at hand, with a compressor and a tyre deflator to do the job!

To find out more about the Adventure Kings range of air compressor equipment, head to www.4WDSupacentre.com.au call us on 1800 88 39 64 or drop into one of company stores or approved dealers to get your hands on a bargain TODAY!